Month: March 2019

Beware the Ides of March (Part II)

To the extent my last post made it seem like I’m handling things with aplomb, I am not. In addition to being sullen and petulant, for the past two weeks Handsome has also been extraordinarily contrary. I am seemingly incapable of providing a correct answer or opinion to save my life. Everything I have done for the last two weeks has been wrong, apparently. This, combined with the HPV and my mom’s health issues, has taken a toll on me.

One week ago, Handsome and I had the worst fight we have ever had, hands down. I had taken my mom to the doctor that morning and it was a miserably unfortunate appointment. There was not an ounce of good news to be had. I drove her home and stopped to check in with Handsome. He saw me walk in the door and immediately returned to fixing his lunch without a single word to me. I asked if he wanted to talk (no kids around) and he basically said that he didn’t think there was anything to discuss. In hindsight, I should have seen the futility of continuing and I should have walked away.

I didn’t do that, of course, so we ended up in one of those fights where I ask repeatedly why he’s giving up and throwing our family away and he says that he doesn’t know what I want from him. It was ugly. Again, I should have walked away. I didn’t. I was convinced that if I just found the right mix of words and said them in the right order that he would “get it” and … well, you can imagine the foolishness and futility of that endeavor.

And then the argument shifted… almost imperceptibly at first. Rather than the vacant stare and shrugged shoulders and “whatevers” I started to hear statements filled with deep resentment. Things about how I’m trying to change him as a person and he doesn’t like who I’m trying to turn him into. (Um, yeah, you’ve been a selfish liar and a philandering addict and I’d very much like you to have integrity and empathy… my bad, as I thought that’s what you wanted too.) Statements about how not everything that happens to me is his fault (well, the HPV certainly is, asshole). Rants about how there is no point in him calling any of his SA or intensive support people because no one is going to tell him how to feel.

I asked him if he was more interested in protecting himself and his pride than he is in preserving his family. He looked at me with the dead-eyes stare that I’m sure you’ve all seen, gave a little, insolent shrug of his shoulders, and said “I guess so, maybe.”

I am utterly humiliated to say it, but I completely snapped. I lost it on him. If I could put my hand on it, I threw it at him… medicine bottles, a tape measure, the tv remote, his Kindle and phone. He made the mistake of passing by our son’s lacrosse stick, so I grabbed that and nailed him on the arm and shoulder with it before I fell into a sobbing, snotty heap in our foyer.

I cried because he’s biting off his nose to spite his face. I cried because he’s going to hurt our kids and he doesn’t seem bothered. I cried because they are truly innocent victims in all of this. I cried because everyone loves him but he doesn’t love himself. I cried because everything has gone to hell since I shared my HPV result with him. (why?) I cried because he has acted like the HPV is some burden I’m unjustly inflicting on him. I cried because he has broken me.

I never throw things. I think it’s ridiculously childish. I don’t tolerate my kids throwing things. I don’t hit people. Ever. I don’t recall ever hitting another human being in my life. (I don’t even like to point at people for goodness sakes.) And yet I hit him, beating on his arm with my fists. Did he intentionally provoke me? I don’t know. I don’t think so. I think it’s more likely that he just grossly overestimated my ability to hold my crap together in the face of all of his insolence, and the other stress and drama.

I left the house to create some space and returned later and I apologized profusely for my behavior. I owned what I did completely. I did not blame him for causing me to snap. He said he deserved it and probably more. (Far be it for me to suggest that, but since he mentioned it… ) And in the days since then? More of the same detached, disinterested, woe-is-me behavior. He did call his sponsor that day. It didn’t seem to help. He had a chance to go to his preferred SA meeting on the weekend. He chose not to go. No journaling. No phone calls to his SA buddies.

Five days later, at our CSAT session yesterday, late into the hour, he referred to me as an abuser. Technically I did abuse him that day, even if it lasted for mere seconds. (If the shoe was on the other foot there would no doubt be comments suggesting that I get a protection from abuse order or get him into anger management counseling and the like.) He told the CSAT that I injured him. I don’t actually believe that to be true – he has absolutely no bruising or other visible signs of injury on his arms or shoulder (the only places struck by me or anything I threw at him that found its mark).  He said that I didn’t apologize “enough.” He may indeed feel that way, but I did apologize profusely and sincerely and with great remorse. I gave him the kind of apology that I always hoped to receive from him. Unfortunately, he didn’t choose to hear it. As I have long suspected, he is not willing to show me the kind of grace that I have been showing him for the last 15 months.

I believe that an apology has three important parts: acknowledge what happened, express sincere empathy and remorse, and make some kind of reparation or atonement. With his own apologies, Handsome struggles with the second step and never manages to get to the third step. Ever. I am trying to make my way through those steps, not solely for him, but because they are important to me. They are important to my own integrity. That behavior is not who I am. (Or is it now? Have I really been damaged and changed that much? My god that’s sad if it’s true.) It is certainly not who I want to be. As easy as it would be to blame him, the years of Handsome’s acting out and deceit and manipulation don’t justify what I did. Explain it, perhaps, but not justify it.

Last evening was blessedly better as he seemed to be trying to get himself back on track. I noticed that he had taken his journals to work (where he normally writes in them) and he had called someone from SA. In a quiet moment I apologized to him, again. He cried and told me how sorry he is that I have to deal with whatever the HPV is going to throw my way. He assured me that we would deal with it together. I hope that is true. He made it to a meeting and came home visibly more grounded.

Was this a “rock bottom” event for us as a couple? I think so. I certainly cannot see myself – cannot allow myself – to sink any further. I cannot wallow in a miserable place. I need to rise, to be the person I was/ am/ want to be so that I can be the mom/ daughter/ friend … and wife… that I know I can be.

The Angry Wife/ Jean-Baptiste Greuze

Beware the Ides of March (Part I)

For all the decades I have gone to the gynecologist and dutifully gotten my PAP and HPV tests, everything has always been negative. Last year, after our first DDay, I promptly scheduled an appointment with my doctor for every STD/ STI test imaginable. All were negative. She performed my annual PAP test but said that she wanted to wait until this year to do an HPV test as my last negative HPV test had been within the last 5 years. At the time, of course, we did not know that Handsome had more than just one affair partner, and that he had acted out in massage parlors and with prostitutes, as well as with a laundry list of other skanks and randos. We did not know how high my risk actually was.

I returned for my annual exam two weeks ago. This year, my PAP was negative, but my HPV test came back positive. More specifically, I tested positive for HPV-16, one of the more virulent strains associated with the development of various forms of cancer. My doctor is lovely and kind and gave me every shred of information she could impart (how my body may clear the virus on its own – although the likelihood of that apparently decreases with age; how we can test aggressively to stay on top of any changes; and how it’s a good thing that we are flagging the issue early; etc.). The logical side of my brain is good. I have a nasty but not unexpected problem, and there is a proactive plan of action in place with a caring and trusted medical professional. The emotional side of my brain, however, is a complete and utter mess.

If I can just vent for a moment… how is it remotely fair that Handsome had really expensive orgasms, and I get an aggressive virus? How did he seriously not know that condoms aren’t magic shields? Did he not read any of the literature when he took our daughter for her HPV vaccination a few years ago? He had to sign a consent form. Did he seriously have her vaccinated for something he knew nothing about? In what way was this outcome unlikely or unpredictable based on his behavior? I am really f’ing hurt, sad, crushed, dismayed, and enraged that he put me in this position. (Insert deep, cleansing breaths here…)

But that’s not the half of it. When I tearfully shared the news with Handsome, he looked stunned and crushed (as he should). And then he opened his mouth. What came out? Not “oh, God, what can I do?” or “you must be so upset, and I am so sorry.” Nope. He turned around and walked away from me and said under his breath to himself “I can’t take any more of this.” Seriously.

He did, shortly thereafter, come back to me and hug me and very briefly say he was sorry. And then…? Nothing. I have been living with him in complete shut down mode for the last two weeks. He is sulking and pouting and barely able to hold a conversation with me. He has stopped making his SA calls. I haven’t seen him journal. He has been to one and only one SA meeting.

At the same time this is going on, I have been dealing with very bad news about my elderly mom’s health. She has a pituitary brain tumor for which the course of action is to ensure it doesn’t grow or bleed. That has been going fine except that she just recently developed atrial fibrillation, the treatment for which includes blood thinning agents to prevent clotting. That treatment is completely counter to the treatment for her tumor. She is receiving the best medical care available, but hers is a difficult situation and there are no good or easy choices. Virtually any treatment option she chooses comes with high risk for one condition or the other. I feel as though I am watching her rapidly decline on a daily basis.

So, when I absolutely need my husband to show up and be there for me, he’s off in some bizarre woe-is-me Victimville, moping about and avoiding all of his recovery resources. If I put on my empathy hat, I can imagine that me testing positive for HPV is hugely painful for Handsome. I can guess that he sees it as a reminder of how dirty his actions were and how careless and irresponsible he was and – perhaps most troubling for him – as evidence of how he not only failed to protect me, but he actually exposed me to harm. That all has to be terrible for him. Fine.

I can put myself in his shoes, but he still needs to dig out his big boy pants and spend a day on my side of the equation. I am stuck living with the consequences of his actions. Those consequences may have been unintended, but they were far from unpredictable.

More to follow…